1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a board insertion/removal apparatus for electronic equipment, which has mother board and a child board.
2. Description of the Related Art
With regard to a piece of electronic equipment having a mother board and a child board installed within an enclosure, there are diverse directions and methods of inserting and removing the child board with relative to the enclosure, depending upon how the equipment is to be used.
For example, in a piece of equipment mounted in a 19-inch rack or the like, there is a need to enable maintenance of a child board without being affected by the equipment mounted above and below the equipment of interest. For this reason, the structure adopted is one in which a mother board is disposed in an upright attitude at the front of the rear panel of the enclosure, and an aperture and a door that can be opened and closed are provided at the front panel of the equipment, a child board being inserted in and removed from the mother board via the aperture in an upright attitude so that it intersects with the mother board substantially perpendicularly, or a structure in which the reverse is done, the mother board being disposed at the rear of the front panel, and the child board being inserted into and removed from the mother board via an aperture and door provided at the rear panel of the equipment. In either type of structure, a plurality of child boards are disposed substantially parallel to each other, and when a child board is inserted or removed, the front part of the child board in the insertion direction is mated with or removed from a connector fixed to the surface of the mother board.
In this structure, in order to cool the inside of the enclosure so as not to affect other equipment, it is necessary to dispose a fan at the rear panel or between the rear panel and the mother board, so that cooling air is caused to flow in the front-to-rear direction of the enclosure.
When cooling air is caused to flow in the front-to-rear direction of the enclosure, however, because the air is largely blocked by the mother board, the cooling effect is not necessarily sufficient.
A form of construction exists which takes into consideration the flow distribution of cooling air, in which the mother board is disposed at the bottom panel of the enclosure, and in which an aperture and cover are provided at the upper panel of the enclosure, a child board being inserted into the mother board via the aperture in an upright attitude relative to the mother board.
Although this structure is effective with regard to air flow relative to the child board, when performing maintenance on a child board it is necessary to pull the entire piece of equipment out to a position outside the rack, at which equipment above and below it in the rack do not present interference, in order to remove the cover on the upper panel of the enclosure to enable maintenance. Additionally, because the entire piece of equipment is pulled out, it is necessary to provide special additional rack mounting rails, thereby increasing the size of the structure. An additional problem arises because of the need to provide safety measures to prevent the rack from falling over, for example, because of the balance in weight between the pulled-out equipment and the rack and other equipment installed therein.
With a conventional structure, it was difficult to achieve both ease of insertion and removal for maintenance and a good distribution of air flow for cooling.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention, in consideration of the above-noted drawbacks in the conventional art, to provide a structure that achieves and improves both the ease of insertion and removal of a child board when performing maintenance for example and the flow of cooling air.
In order to achieve the above-noted objects, a piece of electronic equipment to which the present invention is applied has an enclosure, a mother board, a first connection part, a child board, a second connection part, a guide, a rack gear, a rotating shaft, and a pinion gear. The enclosure has a portioned child board housing part, and an aperture which opens the child board housing part at the side of the enclosure. The mother board is disposed so as to be fixed to the bottom panel of the enclosure. The first connection part is fixed to the mother board, and faces the child board housing part. The child board is inserted in a substantially horizontal direction in a substantially vertical upright attitude through the aperture, and inserted at a temporary attachment position. The second connection part is provide at a lower edge of the child board and, by the child board at the temporary attachment position moving along a substantially vertical direction so as to reach a fully attached position, mates with the first connection part, so as to make an electrical connection. The guide is provided so as to enable free movement between an upper position and a lower position within the child board housing part along a substantially vertical direction. At the upper position, the guide slidably mates with an upper edge part of the child board so as to guide the child board toward the temporary attachment position along a substantially horizontal direction, so that by movement from the upper position to the lower position, the child board at the temporary attachment position is caused to move toward the permanent attachment position in a substantially vertical direction, and at the lower position the upper edge part of the child board is held and maintained in the fully attached position. The rack gear is fixed relative to the guide. The rotating shaft has a pinion gear, which meshes with the rack gear, and is supported so as to enable its rotation relative to the enclosure. By the rotating shaft being rotationally operated in a prescribed direction (forward direction), the guide, via the pinion gear and the rack gear, moves from the lower position to the upper position, and by being rotationally operated in the opposite direction, the guide moves from the upper position to the lower position.
In the above-described mechanism, when the child board is attached, the guide is set at the upper position, the upper edge part of the child board, which is substantially upright in a vertical attitude, being caused to mate with the guide as the child board is inserted from the side aperture into the child board housing part. By this action, the child board, in a substantially vertically upright attitude, is inserted along a substantially horizontal direction into the temporary attachment position within the child board housing part in accordance with the guide.
Once the child board reaches the temporary attachment position, the rotating shaft is caused to rotate in the opposite direction. The effect of the rotating shaft rotating in the opposite direction is that the pinion gear rotates in concert with the rotating shaft, the rack gear meshed with the pinion gear moving downward, and the guide moving to the lower position. By this action, the child board at the temporary attachment position moves along a substantially horizontal direction so as to reach the permanent attachment position, the second connection part and the first connection part mating so as to be mutually connected. In this condition, the guide holds the upper edge part of the child board so as to maintain it in the fully attached position.
To remove the child board, the rotating shaft is caused to rotate in the forward direction. When the rotating shaft rotates in the forward direction, the pinion gear rotates in concert with the rotating shaft, and the rack gear meshed with the pinion gear move upward, the guide moving to the upper position. By this action, the first connection part and the second connection part are disconnected, and the child board at the fully attached position moves along a substantially vertical direction so as to reach the temporary attachment position.
When the child board reaches the temporary attachment position, the child board is pulled out along the guide, and caused to be exposed from the aperture, enabling the complete removal of the upper edge part of the child board from the guide if necessary.
In essence, the insertion and removal of the child board with respect to the mother board within the child board housing part is performed by substantially vertical-direction movement, and the insertion and removal of the child board with respect to the child board housing part is performed by substantially horizontal-direction movement.
The result is that, because the child board is inserted and removed from the side of the enclosure, even if the electronic equipment remains installed within a rack or the like, it is possible to easily remove the child board for maintenance, without interference from other equipment disposed above or below the electronic equipment of interest.
Because the mother board is disposed at the bottom part of the enclosure, the child board being housed and held within the child board housing part in a substantially vertical attitude, by causing cooling air to flow along the child board insertion direction, it is possible achieve a good flow of cooling air, without blockage by either the mother board or the child board.
Additionally, because the insertion and removal of the child board can be performed with the electronic equipment remaining installed in the rack, the need for a rack mounting rail to enable the equipment to be pulled out of the rack is eliminated, as is an increase in the size of the structure, and the need to provide a safety measure to prevent the rack from falling over.
The rotating shaft can be disposed at the top part of the guide in an attitude that is substantially parallel with the insertion direction of the child board, and a plurality of sets rack gears and pinion gears can be provided along the rotating shaft.
By doing the above, there is a further improvement in the vertical movement stability of the child board by the effect of the rack gears and pinion gears.
It is alternatively possible to fix the child board relative to the enclosure within the child board housing part, to perform positioning of the child board at the temporary attachment position by contact with the child board inserted forward edge part, and to further provide a positioning guide member which mates with the inserted forward edge part mating with the slide and the child board and guides the child board from the temporary attachment position to the fully attached position.
By doing the above, the position of the child board at the temporary attachment position is easily and reliably established, and there is a further improvement in the stability of the movement of the child board toward the fully attached position.
A rotationally operated lever can further be provided, so as to extend from the rotating shaft, thereby facilitating rotational operation of the rotating shaft.
The ratio between the length of the lever and the gear diameter of the pinion gear can be established in accordance with the contact pressure with which the first connection part and the second connection part mate. By doing this, it is possible to avoid the application of excessive force when the first and second connection parts are mated or disconnected from one another.